A modern-day fairy tale: Energy companies and the black bears
Humans living in bears’ habitat not a good mix
By DAVE BUCHANAN The Daily Sentinel
Sunday, August 05, 2007
With most of western Colorado being black bear country, and most Coloradans aware of it, you’d think the energy companies that have their covetous paws on nearly all the federal lands in western Colorado would be conscious of being on their best bear-friendly behavior.
Ho, ho, ho. I forget of whom we are speaking.
There’s really no way to decipher the advance planning used by energy companies when they eyeball a prime drilling site. But gee whiz, you’d think someone in the office would realize that wildlife runs wild across most of the public lands virtually donated to oil companies by the Bush administration and that the sudden appearance of trucks, trailers and garbage cans might have an impact on how these wild animals behave.
Evidently not. As countless drilling rigs move into once-wild country, their crews need some place to live close to work, hence the solution: stuffing a couple hundred men in the remote, ghastly named “man camps.”
That’s like plopping down a full-sized trailer court in the middle of bear country and then wondering why there are bears sniffing around.
And it appears energy workers aren’t much different from ranchers when it comes to dealing with wildlife. As long as the animals, whether it’s elk or bears, are hiding out or serving their proper role as targets for paying customers, everything is just fine, thank you.
But have that elk start nosing around a haystack in mid-December or that bear rips the lid off your trash can and suddenly it’s a call to the Colorado Division of Wildlife, “Come get your damn (elk/bear/deer) off my land.”
That’s exactly what’s happening on the Roan Plateau, says the DOW. Energy workers are finding themselves intruders in wildlife land and for some reason aren’t looking in the right spot for the cause of the trouble.
Instead, the workers are acting just like the good people of Boulder, who make pets out of deer and then wonder why a mountain lion is sitting on the back porch.
Rather than looking inside their own shirts, the energy companies have decided it’s easier to stalk the DOW.
“In the past three weeks, I’ve taken more than 40 phone calls from energy workers who want us to ‘do something’ about the bears,” said J.T. Romatzke, the DOW’s district wildlife manager based in Parachute.
That’s a pretty easy fix, isn’t it?
“Do something.”
“Trash storage and trash disposal is the biggest issue right now,” Romatzke said. “Bear-proof trash containers should be provided by the companies for these facilities. Standard trash (D)umpsters or trash cans are not sufficient in this environment.”
Heck, standard-issue Dumpsters or cans aren’t sufficient even in downtown Aspen, so why would anyone think those ursine pull-toys would be fine in bear country?
Oh, right. Again I forget who we’re dealing with here.
Fleets of new four-wheel drive pickups with huge tires and tiny fuel economy take precedence over a couple well-made garbage containers that may save a bear’s life.
Romatzke pointed out that once a bear gets accustomed to a food source, that bear starts to get somewhat protective. Even Goldilocks learned that it’s not wise to get between a bear and its porridge. Maybe the man camps should have storybook hour every night.
“We’ve had some requests for us to trap and relocate bears out of these sites,” DOW Area Manager Dean Riggs said. “But unlike bears that venture into town and become a nuisance, this is a situation where man has come right into the heart of the bears’ habitat and we aren’t willing to punish the bears for that.”
Once again, wildlife suffers simply because it’s minding its own business and living the only life it knows.
Now comes word that energy workers are intentionally feeding bears and posing for pictures with them, a la Boo-Boo and Yogi in Jellystone Park.
I suddenly hear my Aunt Gladys scolding, “Oh sure, it’s all in fun until someone gets an eye poked out.”
Ask long-time game warden Ron Velarde, Northwest Region manager, about this and you really can’t print a single word of his unofficial reply. “Stupid” (my words, not his) might be a good summary of his feelings.
“Feeding bears is against the law and we will write citations,” Velarde said. “This kind of human behavior jeopardizes the safety of the people feeding the bears, but more critically it jeopardizes the safety of every person the bear comes into contact with in the future.”
He probably prefers to emphasize the dangers to the bears’ welfare but his official statement sounds good, too.
I guess the DOW could tranquilize and trap a few energy workers and relocate them to Rock Springs or Pinedale, Wyo., but the agency probably couldn’t keep up with the flood of immigrant workers.
It makes no sense to trap and relocate the bears. Relocate where? First, the Roan is where the DOW takes bears, not removes bears. Second, there’s hardly any bear habitat left that isn’t being drilled.
Still that leaves us with the simplistic “Do something.”
Okay, here’s something: In 17 months, we’ll have a new president and then the oil companies will have to face up to their own egregious behavior.
Until then, may the best bear win.
